Just One Night
by alicia rose potter
Summary: Molly watches her daughter's strength and courage during and after the Battle of Hogwarts, but is still unprepared to accept the woman Ginny's grown into. One-shot.


**Just One Night**

_A/N Hello, everyone! I'm brand new to fanfic of any kind. This is a sweet one-shot that takes place the night after the Weasley family has buried Fred (sniff). Constructive criticism is highly appreciated!_

_Anything you recognize is JK Rowlings; anything you don't is my (unpaid) pastime._

Molly lay awake, staring at the dark ceiling. Arthur was asleep beside her, but how could anyone expect a mother to sleep the night after she's buried her son? Exhaustion pinned her to the bed, suppressing her mothering urge to wander to each room and check on her remaining children. And anyway, she knew what most of them were up to without checking.

She could hear whispers from Bill's room – that would be her oldest and his wife. Charlie had moved into the twins' room, wrapped in a thick quilt on the floor. He claimed he didn't like sleeping on beds anymore, but Molly knew he was giving Bill and Fleur their own room, keeping an eye on George, and trying not to invade the space Fred's memory still had for George, all at the same time. Still, with him on the floor, George wouldn't be going anywhere. Percy's quill was scratching away in his room. Ron was snoring from the top of the stairs. Despite her youngest boy's apparently deep slumber, Ron would wake in an instant if Harry or Hermione started to leave.

Ginny had just stopped pacing and crawled into her bed. Molly knew the sounds of the creaky bed frame and the rustle of Ginny's quilt. Hopefully her daughter would now be able to get some sleep. Conflicting images flashed through her mind at the thought of her youngest child.

_A jet of green light flying past Ginny's red hair as Bellatrix laughed. The parody of Christmas was enough to turn Molly's stomach, but the fear and anger that flashed through her overruled it completely. **No one** would hurt her daughter._

_Her daughter's face as she saw Fred, Remus, Tonks, and Colin lying in the Great Hall. The sleeve of Ginny's robe was torn, her hair loose and tangled, and she was covered in streaks of dirt and grass stains. There was blood on her hands and knees and over one shoulder where she had helped to carry people in from the front lawn. The expected devastation and grief was clear on her features, but the strength that burned in Ginny's eyes took even her mother by surprise._

_The calm with which Ginny gazed on Harry the first time they met after Harry finally woke up. It was not the usual Weasley temper and passion. What she couldn't see was the blazing look in Ginny's eyes that Harry knew so well._

_Ginny standing at the head of Fred's grave, fistfuls of dirt in her hands. Her face was stony as the sun shone down on her, illuminating her long red hair against her black robe. As Ginny spoke clearly and eloquently about Fred, her features finally relaxed and a small smile flitted across her lips. Ginny was incredible all day, holding her brothers and even her mother close as they tried to accept their brother and son wasn't coming back. Even through her grief Molly was astounded by the strength her little girl had. Ginny had grown up._

Her musings were interrupted by a creak of the stairs. Listening to the light tread, Molly decided it had to be her daughter coming up. The boys, even when they were trying to be sneaky, couldn't walk like that. Molly levered herself up and placed her feet in her slippers. She wanted Ginny to know that she was here for her.

* * *

Molly didn't know the toll that being so strong had taken on her daughter. Ginny had been pacing back and forth across her small room, struggling with her grief while tears ran down her face. She believed all of the things she'd said about living life at Fred's funeral that afternoon, but it was harder when she was all alone in the dark. Ginny could feel the exhaustion seeping through her limbs, but for a long time refused to lie down. Finally she gave in and crawled in bed.

As Ginny lay in bed and stared at the ceiling, she felt the pain of the entire last year crashing down on her. Seeing her friends lying in the Great Hall. Believing Harry was dead. Thinking she or Hermione or Luna were going to die while dueling Bellatrix. Being told to stay behind because she was too young **again**, while everyone she cared about was going to fight. Burying her brother, and watching her family's pain. Looking into Harry's guilty green eyes. A whole year of fear and defiance and pain. Great-Aunt Muriel's constant nagging about the deportment of a proper lady after Easter hols. Not knowing where Ron, Hermione and Harry were, or if they were even alive. Hermione's scars, and Luna's thin frame. Watching Hermione disapparate from Bill's wedding with the two boys in her hands. The images flashed before her eyes until Ginny though she was going to go mad. She needed someone to make it stop. After all day of being strong, Ginny needed him.

Tears still streaming down her face, she crept slowly out of her room and up the stairs, hoping her mum was as exhausted as she was and deeply asleep. After everything else today, her mum didn't need to find her sneaking into her boyfriend's room late at night.

* * *

Molly started as the footsteps creeping up the stairs continued past her door. Suddenly it dawned on her that it was never her mum Ginny was coming to for comfort. She hurried to the doorway and saw her daughter halfway up the last flight of stairs.

"Ginevra Molly Weasley!" Molly hissed. "Somehow I doubt you're going up there to check on Ron!"

Ginny froze at the sound of her mum's whisper. She turned around slowly, not knowing how her mum was going to react. Seeing hands on hips, she sighed and sat down on the stair.

Molly was surprised to see Ginny quietly sit on the stair. She was even more surprised to see Ginny was crying. She moved up the stairs and sat by her daughter. Ginny leaned into her, but didn't say anything.

"Ginny," Molly whispered, but choked. She couldn't ask what was wrong. Too much was wrong.

"I love you, Mum," Ginny said in a strangled whisper, "but I need him right now." Molly tensed at her daughter's words. Ginny rolled her eyes at the way she knew her mum had interpreted her words.

"Not the way you're thinking, Mum," she told her mother with a sigh. Molly, unsure of what Ginny meant, waited for an explanation. "I don't need a lecture on how grief can make you…want to do…things...with…people…" Ginny stuttered out. A brief look of humor flitted across Molly's face at her daughter's discomfort. Ginny leaned harder into her mum. "I just need someone to…to hold onto me, I guess," she continued. "And I know he understands. He knows how you feel…when Tom looks at you with those horrible red eyes and he– he **knows** you. He's **known** me, Mum, the same way he knows Harry, ever since…"

At this, Ginny's whisper faded away and Molly held her weeping daughter tight to her side. "Ginny, dear, I know a little how you feel, but I simply can't allow you to go up there at night," Molly began, expecting Ginny to interrupt her. When it never came, she looked down at her daughter.

"Please, Mum. Just one night," Ginny whispered. "I just want someone to hold onto me, just tonight. I'll be alright in the morning." She lifted her face to peer into her mum's eyes, trying to gauge the reaction to her plea.

Molly couldn't look her daughter in the eye, and instead looked down at the tired old slippers she wore. They had been bunny slippers a long time ago, but now they looked more like crazed koalas. When Molly had lost a friend for the first time, she'd run to Arthur much the way Ginny was sneaking to Harry now. Arthur, unsure what to do with that level of hysteria, had tried to cheer her up by making the bunny slippers dance, but the charm had just made the ears shrink until they could barely be seen. Molly wiggled her toes, watching the faded, frayed slippers twitch. This was her only daughter, her youngest child. What was she supposed to do?

Ginny swiped at her eyes and started to pull away from her mum. "I'll just go back down, then," she muttered. Molly caught her daughter's hand and Ginny turned to look at her mum. Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, and her nose had been running. Her hair was a tangled, rumpled mess. It reminded Molly of the times when Ginny had cried as a little girl. But Ginny wasn't a little girl anymore. Molly knew that. Seeing her standing here on the steps, Molly knew she was going to let Ginny upstairs.

Molly sighed. "Let's go check on the boys and Hermione, shall we?" she whispered. Ginny followed her up the stairs to Ron's door. She stood a little behind her mum as Molly pushed open the door.

The cramped orange room was illuminated by a tiny light shining from the tip of Harry's wand. Ron and Hermione were curled up together in Ron's bed, but Harry was clearly awake. He looked startled as Molly poked her head in. She frowned at Ron and Hermione sleeping together, but was overcome by curiosity when she saw what Harry was doing.

He was holding a blank book in his lap. Scattered around him were what looked to be like fragments of paper. In front of him was a small pot. In his hands he held a paintbrush with a scrap of paper sticking to it. Papers were stuck all over Harry's hands and arms.

Ginny looked out from behind her mum as Molly whispered, "Harry dear, what on earth are you doing?" A tear slipped down Harry's face.

"I wanted to remember…the same as what Hagrid did…" he whispered. "But I can't make the glue work right and I'm just ruining them…" Another tear followed the first. Molly didn't understand what Harry meant, but Ginny had moved close enough to see that the scraps of paper were in fact photographs, and the blank book a photo album. Ginny knew about the album of his parent's photos Hagrid had given him, and knew before she saw that these photos would be of Fred, Colin, Remus and Tonks, and all of the others. A sob caught in her throat at Harry's child-like desperation with the glue.

Harry looked up, startled by the sound Ginny had made. He started to get up when he saw her tearstained face, nearly tipping over his pot of glue. Molly caught the pot and set it on the night stand. Gently, she kissed his forehead despite the sticky mess and gathered up the photos and the empty album, setting them next to the glue.

"Ginny," Harry whispered, oblivious to Molly's cleaning spell.

"Couldn't sleep," she choked out. She sat on the bed as Molly finished tidying up.

"I'll show you a sticking charm in the morning, dear. I think I have some old photos of Fred you can have in the attic too." Molly sniffed at the thought of Fred's old photos, and Ginny put her hand on her mum's shoulder.

"Thanks, Mum," she whispered. Harry nodded. Another tear ran down his cheek, but he put his arms around Ginny.

Molly looked at the two of them together on the bed. Harry buried his face in Ginny's hair, shoulders shaking, and Ginny was crying again too. She turned her head to look at her mum, still standing by the bed. Her mum had an odd expression on her face.

"Mum?" she whispered.

Molly smoothed the hair away from her daughter's forehead. "Goodnight, dear. I'll see you in the morning." Ginny gave her a tiny smile as Molly turned to go back downstairs and go back to bed. From above her she heard Harry whisper to Ginny, "Sshh, Gin, don't cry anymore."

"You're a filthy hypocrite," she heard her daughter mutter back. Molly smiled a tiny smile. That was the Ginny she knew. She crawled into bed beside Arthur, who wrapped his arm around her, still half-asleep.

"You're a good mum, Mollywobbles," he breathed into her ear.

"You make good slippers, dear," she replied.

Arthur cracked an eyelid at that, and then smiled bemusedly at her before falling back asleep. Molly lay there for a minute more, hearing the old camp bed above her creak as two bodies shifted in it to go to sleep. When her children were quiet and settled, she finally allowed her eyes to drift closed.


End file.
